Huskies
still want
to bowl

Published 1:00 am, Saturday, November 20, 2004

EAST HARTFORD - The curls of smoke floating out of the UConn football office these days come in alternating patterns.

One minute, the smoke streams out of
Randy Edsall
's ears. The next, it pours out of the remote control, after too many sequences of rewind-stop-play, rewind-stop-play.

After watching UConn lose three of its last four games - and two straight - Edsall has devoted himself to stopping the big play. He can't watch the two blocked punts at
Georgia Tech
anymore. He can't stomach the Hail Mary touchdown at Syracuse to end the first half.

"I analyze (the big plays) every Saturday after the game," Edsall said. "We look at the tape and say, 'Why did this occur?' It's not something that we like, but it's something that happens sometimes."

Edsall hopes today will be different.

After giving up 100-yard head starts to West Virginia, Syracuse and Georgia Tech, the Huskies will finally get a level playing field when they host Buffalo at Rentschler Field in the 2004 home finale. Kickoff is set for noon.

With bowl eligibility and a winning season still within reach, UConn (5-4, 2-3) has plenty of motivation for this game. As for the Bulls (2-8, 2-6), who routed Central Michigan, 33-6, last weekend, this game is a chance to play spoiler and beat UConn for the just the second time in eight meetings.

"They're a good team. We've got to prepare for the team and we've got to prepare for the environment," said Buffalo coach
Jim Hofher
, who will come back to East Hartford next season on Sept. 3 in the final game of a four-year contract. "Our goal is to play a highly competitive, emotionally charged football game."

"When you combine them, we've got a pretty good tailback," Hofher said. "But I don't know that any one of them individually would be creating the same kind of production that the four of them have created together."

Although the Bulls average 156.8 yards per game, Buffalo quarterback
P.J. Piskorik
accounts for 19.9 of those yards each week. Either way, Hofher hopes Buffalo's running game will be enough to snuff UConn's emotion today.

The Huskies will honor 22 seniors before the game, including the team's tri-captains: quarterback
Dan Orlovsky
, middle linebacker
Alfred Fincher
and left tackle Ryan Krug.

There were also two unexpected additions to the list of honorees: tight end
Tim Lassen
and left tackle
Michael Kodish
. Both chose not to return to UConn for a fifth year, Edsall said.

"You respect those decisions because they got their degrees, and now, they're going to move on because they know football isn't going to be a (professional) avenue for them," said Edsall, who was notified of their decisions after the Oct. 13 game against West Virginia.

But the loss of Lassen and Kodish wouldn't have changed anything this season. The Huskies just can't self-destruct anymore, not if they hope to make a bowl game.

"Would we like to be playing a little bit better? Of course, we would," Edsall said, answering his own question. "All of us would like to be playing those perfect games and doing those sort of things.

"But for us, the one thing is, you just have to keep working and you just have to keep trying to improve. Last week, we went out on offense and didn't turn the ball over and only had three penalties and we still lost. You always want to be playing better than you are."